The organic sector was still recording double-digit growth in food retailing this year. For the organic harvest Styria, innovative marketing concepts are an important topic for the future.
Organic farming is the big innovation of the last 30 years. While in 1988 a reasonably small manageable number of 200 farms operated according to biological guidelines, by 2018 there were already 4000. At the moment, this corresponds to a quarter of the agricultural area of Styria. Within the food retail trade (LEH), the industry also still registers double-digit growth figures. In concrete terms, in the first half of 2018 an increase of 10 percent was recorded compared to the previous year.
The big proprietary brands "Zurück zum Ursprung“, "JA! Natürlich“ and "Natur Pur" are the driving factors in sales. The Upper Styrian dairy industry alone now markets organic milk from 460 farms via the ZZU organic milk project. But many small regional marketing initiatives also make people sit up and they give reason for hope.